


forget-me-nots of angels

by LiliaFax



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Body Image, F/F, Fluff and Angst, Friendship, Gen, Self-Esteem Issues, calliope thinks about death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-07
Updated: 2014-01-07
Packaged: 2018-01-07 19:30:33
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,752
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1123542
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LiliaFax/pseuds/LiliaFax
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>While preparing for the final confrontation with her brother, Calliope makes the decision to show her true form to the one she initially shared her name with. </p><p>Even though the thought of rejection terrifies her, Calliope wants Roxy to know the truth before Calliope has to go and face her brother for what could be the last time.</p>
            </blockquote>





	forget-me-nots of angels

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Saetre](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Saetre/gifts).



> You know how in a lot of RPGs at the point before the final boss, you'll have a point where you can stock on your items and grind for levels and stuff? That's the idea behind the setting of this. In particular, imagine the scenes in Flanoir in _Tales of Symphonia_ , because that's literally where the idea for this setting came from.  
> Title is from Evangeline: A Tale of Acadie by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, which doesn't have any particular significance, aside from the line the phrase comes from and the few lines above it.  
>    
> So, with that in mind, enjoy the fic!

There’s something different in the air and you can sense it keenly. Ever since everyone gathered together, vowing to destroy Lord English once and for all and preparing for that battle, there’s been a certain tension vibrating through the whole group.

After all, navigating to this point, this final moment before the end has been difficult enough. You did not witness the fights to regain lost friends, to regain control, but you did hear about them. You know about the tears shed and the heart shattering fear that it might not work.

 After all, your new friend, the one who finally brought you into this group to defeat your brother, was one of the “lost”.

Knowing how close someone as sweet and amazing as Jade Harley was to simply ceasing to be makes the threat of your brother even more real. You of all people should have that risk drilled down in your bones even before that, but your own resignation to your death did not translate well enough. Although Jade was nearly gone for a different reason, you can’t help but to apply the situation to the menace your brother poses.

You have had years to accept your own death and the possibility of being erased from reality. Thinking of that happening to your friends is harder to swallow and you know you have willfully ignored the possibility for too long.

Preparations for the final confrontation all seem to accept the very real possibility that not everyone will escape from the battle in one piece. The thought hovers in the air as back-up plans for the back-up plans are made, as skills are honed and sharpened in last minute attempts to grind for levels.

You are almost certain that you will not survive. You’ve been playing with death and fate since the day you hatched sharing a body with your brother. There’s a certain grace and poetry to the concept of your final moments being used to bring down your brother. As far as you know, when the both of you die, your entire violent species will go extinct. You aren’t as sad about that as you should be. There could still be another cherub out there, but somehow you can’t visualize it.

The new universe that should come after this battle would be wise to eliminate cherubim from existence, you think. All you know about your species leads you to think this.

You read once in your investigations of humanity about a person who wanted to die with no regrets. As you go over your impending erasure from reality, you find that you understand this sentiment. You want to make sure that you don’t leave any what if’s, any loose dangling threads. Your deck of secrets remains mostly unknown to everyone, the cards hidden from anyone who isn’t you. However, you think that before you finally die for good, you need to throw the cards on the table, so to speak.

You owe it to them. You owe it to her.

After all, Roxy is the one you initially explained what you were to, the one you solemnly gave your name as you finally gave up that part of the agreement with your brother.

You think you would very much regret it if Roxy never saw what you really looked like, no matter how much it terrifies you. However, that terror sticks in your throat and stops you cold from making steps to show Roxy your most precious secret.

You first broach the idea to Jade during one of her breaks, while she’s away from the others. You’ve always been in your trollsona disguise when with Jade, but you’ve mentioned that you have another form in passing. Jade never prodded about it, which you appreciate immensely. You figure Jade could help you with this decision. You consider Jade a friend and you don’t have the same baggage with Jade as you do with your other friends (Jane would be your go-to otherwise, but honestly you are equally scared to bring up the idea with her as you would be straight going up to Roxy).

Jade agrees to help you and the two of you get to work. Jade thinks that the reveal should be something special and comes up with the idea of using your combined Space powers to create a space to show Roxy in. You go with her idea because you can’t come up with anything better, really. Just taking her aside one day and dropping the disguise where anyone uninvited could walk in is absolutely unacceptable.

For her credit, Jade seems honestly happy to help you. She indulges you and this scheme you are preparing, winking at you when you pass each other and throwing herself fully into creating the room. Jane and Dirk definitely suspect something. You can tell from the looks they give you when you are with Jade, from their movements when they sit by you. Jake is blessedly oblivious, as you expected him to be. That’s one less of the group to be on your tail.

You avoid Roxy during this time, as your plans revolve around her. You still see her in passing and when you do your heart skips a beat or two, something you chalk up to nervousness and fear about what you’re planning to do.

However, you know that you owe it to her. From the moment you chose Roxy to reveal your name to, from the moment you typed out those eight letters and explained what a cherub was, you owed her. She deserves to know what you look like before you die.

That doesn’t stop you from being terrified of the idea.

\---

Your preparations for the reveal go fairly smoothly. You figure out when and where to do it and even decide what the room will look like. After all, this reveal will make or break your relationship with Roxy, and as much as that leaves you breathless with fear, you know in your core that you have to own the decision.

You send Roxy a simple message asking to meet in a few hours and end it with your signature emoticon. She responds promptly and agrees. Her text is free of most of the drunken typos you were so used to, which makes you feel proud and scared at the same time. You’re proud that she finally stopped drinking, but scared of what this newfound soberness will mean for your reveal. There will be no alcohol glasses here to hide anything. Just you and your disgusting, terrible self.

You don’t drop your disguise until you reach the area that you’ve set aside for the event. You created this little pocket of space, and with a little help from Jade, made it so no one could get in without your consent. It’s safe and you’re in your element. Stars blink around you, as neither you nor Jade could resist bringing space into the room. You watch the stars and galaxies swirl and twinkle before taking a deep breath and allowing your trollsona to fall away from your body.

Feeling your body settle into place strikes you hard. Living in your trollsona is strange, a constant buzz of magic running right under the surface, to the point where you don’t notice it until it’s gone. The absence of the buzz feels strange and foreign to you, even though you haven’t been living constantly in your trollsona for that long.

You sit on the floor, legs folded neatly, and place your hands in your lap to keep from picking at your suit or anything else. You look at them briefly and the long bony fingers almost make you sick. You look away before you can dwell too long on that thought.

Roxy shows up while you are counting stars. You made sure that she would have easy, unhindered access to the room, just in case you were too absorbed in something else to answer her. Of course, counting stars (you were at 125 just then) does not take much mental energy. Her entering draws your attention immediately.

“Callie? Are you here?” she calls out, looking around.

She looks a bit disheveled, having come straight from one of the last minute training sessions going on, but her eyes are bright and alert, glittering like the stars you were just counting.

Your heart jumps into your throat and you swallow a few times, trying to get rid of the mass. It won’t budge so you squeak out a reply despite it.

“Y-yes. I’m here, Roxy,” your voice whispers, sounding so tentative and frightened.

“Over there? I think I see you, but I’m not sure,” Roxy asks, pointing toward where you are sitting. You nod wordlessly, then remember that she probably can’t see the gesture and utter a small yes. Roxy starts her way over to you.

You contemplate running away at this moment. Perhaps you can fade away into the stars around you. After all, if you were a star, then you would never have to make this sort of reveal in the first place. A star would be prettier and better than you could ever hope to be. A star wouldn’t have to worry about her brother coming to destroy the very fabric of reality and the responsibilities of that, or face the fear of losing a friend.

You ache to reequip your trollsona. You could easily come up with some other story for why you called Roxy here, and you think that although she wouldn’t believe you, she would accept it. You really think that, she accepts too much from you.Your hands clench and unclench in your lap and you can almost picture them gray and neat, perfect.

“Callie? Is that you?” Roxy’s voice sounds above you, close enough that you know she’s right by you now. She sounds different, wary almost. Your stomach cools instantly, condensing into one solid, dark, vulgar mass.

You bow your head more. You can’t bear to look at her.

“Yes,” you whisper. “This is me. I… I wanted you to see what I really looked like.”

Cherubs rarely cry, you aren’t built for it, but this strange world-between-worlds allows for odder things to occur. At least now you know what the pressure and pain behind your eyes means, so it doesn’t alarm you now. You close your eyes to try and stem them.

 

Roxy doesn’t say anything for a moment and each second that passes makes the ache and pressure grow. You can hear her breathe, soft and slow.

“Oh, Callie,” is all you hear before there are arms around you, squeezing gently. You don’t quite know how to react to it, you’re still so new at hugging, so you stiffen up in her grasp.

Roxy hasn’t said anything other than your name and that makes you nervous, but you remind yourself that she hasn’t gone running yet. Although, you don’t know if Roxy would do that, even if she found you disgusting and terrible. Maybe she’s just making herself stay to make you feel better.

You try to calm yourself as she keeps hugging you, taking a deep breath and holding it in just like you used to do to quell any negative emotion you were feeling. You let out the breath and it shudders out of your body, catching Roxy’s attention.

She catches your eyes and locks you in place with them. Her eyes have always been beautiful to you, vibrant pools of pink unlike anything you’ve seen in any of your research on humanity or trolls. All of them, Dirk, Jake, and Jane, have shockingly bright eyes but Roxy’s always stood out out to you. You feel trapped in her gaze but you aren’t necessarily unhappy about that fact. You actually rather like it.

“Callie,” she says ever so softly and her eyes sparkle with the shine of a million stars. She opens her mouth as though she’s going to say more then closes it and smiles, wide enough to show off her teeth. Your breath catches again as it leaves you.

“You aren’t scared of me?” you say tentatively, scared to break the strange silence that is stretching between the two of you.

“As if I could be scared of you, Callie,” she drags out the last syllable of your nickname then removes her arms from you. You instantly miss the feeling.

“It’s a little weird but I’m used to weird,” she says. You make a face, as well as you can and her eyes widen a little. “Wait, was that the wrong thing to say? I didn’t mean it bad if that’s what you’re thinking.”

“It is quite alright, Roxy. I’m not offended in the slightest,” you say and the strange thing is, you aren’t. Perhaps you were expecting something much worse, but being told that you look a little “weird” does not hurt you in the ways you prepared yourself for.

It stings a little, but you’re well acquainted with numbing your own emotional distress. You didn’t live with the constant taunts of your brother without developing any strategies.

Roxy leans into you suddenly and you are taken by surprise by the action, widening your eyes to look at her. You can’t imagine you are very comfortable, all bones and sharp edges.

“Nah, you’re fine, Callie. Cuddling is super fun, we should totally do it. But not ‘do it’, just cuddle like a pair of cute little cuddlebugs. Like I’m doing now, ha ha,” she says, giggling. You must have voiced your thoughts aloud. The thought is embarrassing and you want to bury your head in your hands but Roxy is currently locking one of your arms to your side. You settle with taking your free arm and tucking your face into your elbow.

Roxy continues to laugh and it’s so light and joyful that you start to feel your own heart take in that light and joy, soaking it up so it spreads through your body. You find a laugh of your own bubbling up through you, warm and sparkling. Laughs truly are contagious, you think as you bite down on your laughs. However, you can’t stop it from spilling out from you despite your efforts. Your sleeve muffles the ensuing giggles and before you can quell them, your laughs mirror Roxy’s in intensity.

You don’t know if you’ve ever laughed this hard in the past. It is an amazing, foreign feeling. You now understand where the term “gut-bursting laughter” comes from.

As your giggles die down, you are left with a light, airy feeling in your bones, like you’ve released something you were carrying with you that you didn’t know you were carrying. You’re still aware that you are not in your disguise, that Roxy can see the thing you really are, but somehow the pressure of that fact feels infinitely lighter.

You look over at Roxy, who is curled up in your side still. She looks up at you, hair falling slightly into those beautiful eyes.

“You know, Callie. Your eyelashes are really, really pretty,” she says. She smiles, nice and thoughtful. “I’m really happy that you’re my friend. And thank you for sharing this with me. For trusting me with something like this. That… that means a lot.”

That little compliment fills you up as the high from your laughing fit flees you. This feeling is much richer though, like syrup, and you can tell it’s going to stay. Roxy thinks that a part of you is pretty, especially when you’re happy. Roxy thinks that you are worth being a friend. Roxy hasn’t run away screaming from you, in fear or disgust or anything else.

Roxy is thankful that you trusted her with your secrets.

“Thank you, too. Thank you for everything,” you say and close your eyes, just listening to Roxy’s breathing. You feel calm in a way you haven’t felt since you could remember.

You and Roxy lay curled up and entwined with each other under your false stars and the weight of the upcoming battle melts away. You are happy. You are secure.

In a strange way, you are free.

 --

_Meanwhile apart, in the twilight gloom of a window's embrasure,_

_Sat the lovers, and whispered together, beholding the moon rise_

_Over the pallid sea, and the silvery mist of the meadows._

_Silently one by one, in the infinite meadows of heaven,_

_Blossomed the lovely stars, the forget-me-nots of the angels._

_-Evangeline: A Tale of Acadie, Part the First- III_

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! I hope this satisfied your prompt, Saetre. This was my first Ladystuck so I really hope I did a good job.
> 
> An additional thanks to my friend for reading this over for me and editing some things to make it read smoother. You're great!


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